Odonata de la semaine

If I seem not to have blogularly blamed the patriarchy in days and days, it is because I have been extremely diverted by blaming the patriarchy in my actual life. No cause for alarm, though. I’ll be back soon.

Please accept this dragonfly as a token of my esteem.

Also, I finally saw The Killing of Sister George. Ha! Some dude director interprets lesbo ‘drama’ for mainstream audience. In the course of my career as a spinster aunt-to-be, I watched this exact movie transpire about 876 times. You dykes know what I’m talking about.

26 comments

I thought you hadn’t updated because a concerned cyberdude had taken so much time and effort to explain to you his scintillating critique of feminism that you were eventually persuaded to abandon all blamery.

Aw, fuck that dude. It says right there in the FAQ that this blog deletes antifeminist ‘concern’. I can’t imagine what the big deal is. He can spew that crap on every other blog in the universe, practically. But this one will never cave.

Sniper

June 28, 2007 at 7:33 pm (UTC -6)

I see you’ve fallen under the spell of the Special Gay Night on TCM. Did you also happen to catch Walk on the Wild Side, the film that asks the all-important question, who is the most miscast, Laurence Harvey as a farmer/drifter, Anne Baxter as a Mexican widow, or Capucine as a prostitute in the dirty thirties?

Damn, Sniper, no shit. And don’t forget Jane Fonda, overacting as usual, in the role of the bubbly slut.

The Reverend B. Dagger Lee

June 28, 2007 at 7:50 pm (UTC -6)

Actual life blaming? Do tell.

Ah, The Killing of Sister George is so sick and twisted, love that movie, so delish. The sad part is that Notes on a Scandal is much more misogynistic and old-spinster-slagging, and it’s like what, fifty years later?

Dyke drama! Once, in London, many years ago when I was young and unwise and tender, I exited a dyke bar and came upon the spectacle of a Siouxie-and-the-Banshees-Clone beating up her girlfriend.

She had her girlfriend down on her knees on the pavement and was ripping her hair out. I thought we should do something, so my girlfriend stepped forward and said, “Hey, we don’t–”

And quicker than you can say NaziFuckingBitch, Siouxie grabbed her hair, and forced her down on her knees too. Siouxie had both hands occupied, so I stepped forward and said, “Hey, stop–”

And she headbutted me in the nose.

Then she went off with her girlfriend, the both of them cursing us.

I can’t condone girlfriend-battering, but I think of that chick kind of fondly and all admiring-like, because man, she was efficient.

Twisty, were you watching Turner Classic Movies at 4:30 this morning because you couldn’t sleep because a massive two-hour thunderstorm (which miraculaously didn’t kill the power) just wouldn’t go away? Because that’s how I finally got to see “The Killing of Sister George”.

Dreadful, wasn’t it? Susannah York as a pretty blonde blank screen on which women (instead of men) got to project their fantasies, Coral Brown as a rapacious dragon-lady lesbo, Beryl Reid as a nasty drunken bull-dagger. This is the movie which the ignorant Richard Schickel said “really penetrates the queer mind and milieu”? (And how the fuck would he know?)

And yet Sister George was actually sort of cool, at least in theory: brassy, no-bullshit, disdainful in the closet and its discontents. If the play had been written by a woman, if the character hadn’t been made so determinedly one-note, she would have been awesome.

PhysioProf

Frigga's Own

June 29, 2007 at 2:35 am (UTC -6)

For those who aren’t blessed with the expense and stupidity of cable television, is this movie something we should seek out via Netflix or our local libraries? I have no doubt that I could get this movie, I just don’t want to bump anything from my library list if it’s not worth the time. I’m desperately trying to get them to send me Deepa Mehta’s films at the moment.

Johanna

Bubba: Suddenly Last Summer, and what a miserable bit o’ whirling excrement it was.

I can’t believe I knew that. Yecch.

Ganza

June 29, 2007 at 8:40 am (UTC -6)

I’m glad you’re coming back. I’ve been itching to do some blaming for a few days now.

stekatz

June 29, 2007 at 9:04 am (UTC -6)

That dragonfly could have a movie of her own. She looks like the mysterious gondolier of some fantastical barge that takes hapless liberal dudes, rape apologists, MRA’s and concern anti-feminists to the Island Of Twisty where wild Blamers dressed in gem sweaters and gold lame pants deprogram them of their patriarchal beliefs. Viva La Revolucion.

incognotter

June 29, 2007 at 10:03 am (UTC -6)

Tata: “‘Suddenly Last Summer’, and what a miserable bit oâ€™ whirling excrement it was.”

I was astounded at just *how much* I could hate Hepburn. She was the epitome of the narcissistic, delusional lying mother. (I blame such mothers on the Patriarchy.)

larkspur

June 29, 2007 at 10:45 am (UTC -6)

I remember one of the first movies I saw in which a lesbian character was sympathetic. It was a John Carpenter TV movie called “Someone’s Watching Me!” (USA 1978). O yes, cheeezy. It starred Lauren Hutton as a TV exec who’s just moved cross-country to a new job. The lesbian character is played by the delightful Adrienne Barbeau, Lauren’s new co-worker. Barbeau cleverly asks Hutton, “Who was he?”, referring to the man who must have broken Hutton’s heart in order for her to have left the great job and go to a new city, partnerless.

Hutton tosses the question back at Barbeau (on the grounds that Barbeau has said she’s partnerless as well). “Who was she,” Adrienne corrects. Short discussion of whether Lauren considers it a problem, and Lauren doesn’t, so now Adrienne and Lauren are new best friends.

And of course Adrienne gets murdered by Lauren’s stalker while trying to help Lauren. Because, see, that’s one of the next stages in the portrayal of previously marginal types of characters on TV and in film: they are no longer insane, depraved, or horrific. They are sympathetic, asexual, and doomed.

But Adrienne and Lauren are pretty. Almost as pretty as that checkered setwing.

Twisty, I have been worried about you and the rain. At least I can be reassured that in Travis County, Texas, at least you and a checkered setwing are still bright-eyed and bushy-winged.

Antoinette Niebieszczanski

June 29, 2007 at 11:54 am (UTC -6)

Yeah, quit hogging all the rain. Everything up here is brown and crispy. It’s enough to make me think I’m back in SoCal.

tinfoil hattie

June 29, 2007 at 11:55 am (UTC -6)

That is an AWESOME photo. If “gentleman farmer” isn’t a code word for “professional photographer,” perhaps it should be.

And, regarding Dudes who come here to “help”? Instead of immediately banning, perhaps we could band together in a vile mixture of black widow spider and Lord of the Flies to lure him in, coquettishly, then SMACK down, THEN ban.

Oh, and Frigga’s Own? The Deepa Mehta movies are worth the wait. Great stuff, every one of ‘em. Make sure you watch the DVD extras, too, as they are quite instructive, even though they will likely send you into a blaming frenzy.

And after that frenzy, I recommend a chaser of Bend It Like Beckham, just because it’s light and fluffy but also Indian-flavored, and because the DVD extras include the director Gurinder Chadha making aloo gobi with her mom.

Haven’t seen ‘The Killing of SIster George,’ but ‘Notes on a Scandal’ made my teeth hurt. Made every individual strand of hair hurt. And that it was Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett doing it just pissed me off.

Thank you for the compliment,kitchenMage. I shoot most of my bug photos with a Canon 1D and the Canon 180mm macro lens with a 2X extender, then zap the hell out of’em in Photoshop.

Liz

July 23, 2007 at 11:33 am (UTC -6)

Thank you for your stunningly beautiful photograph. And for your wise and witty words – they inspire me here in the Czech Republic and I’ve shared your website with other pals in need of shots of sanity, and spiders. La lotta continua indeed, and beauteous insects can only help.

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